Steve Waugh Kicks Off Realty ‘Match’ in India, Targets NRIs First

Not a cricket news but pure property venture. Entering the huge and unorganized Indian realty market, former Australian cricketer Steve Waugh has kicked off India edition of his Waugh Global Realty, to cater mainly the housing needs of NRI community abroad.

“Our portal, ‘waughglobal.com’ will help them (NRIs) find the right property in a transparent and hassle free manner,” company’s Chairman Steve Waugh said hitting at the non-transparent deals mushrooming in India’s realty sector.

“There is a lot of enthusiasm about the Indian realty market among the NRIs who are looking at good properties in the country not only from the investment angle but also to come and settle down later,” he told PTI in an interview.

The online website has only 91 properties listed on its portal from 10 developers across seven cities — Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Pune, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai and Kolkata. However, Waugh is confident that the number would soon grow once reliability factor plays in.

Waugh Global has joined partnership with developers like the Lodha Group, Godrej, Shapoorji, K Raheja, Kalpataru, Kolte Patil and Sobha Developers so far.

The USP of the website is not merely displaying the properties available but also provide a comprehensive range of additional services, said the company’s MD Dean Honan.

The services include property management, rental solutions, land advisory services, NRI qualification and activation services, besides the scope to enter the Australian property sales and market.

While India is already over-populated in terms of thousands of property portals, he said, being a global player would give them the advantage over the domestic players.

“We want to emerge as the global leader in this segment by catering to the demands of NRIs who are keenly looking at this market as an investment destination. We will not only list properties but also provide services that will lessen the hassles of buyers,” Honan said.

To begin with Waugh Portal will focus on seven metros and slowly expand into other regions, he said. “Currently our focus will be on these seven markets and we will try to crack the best deals. Gradually we will bring some more developers on our board,” he said.

Explaining the business process, he said the portal will charge a certain percentage of the deal money from both the developer as well as the buyer, depending on their choice for specialised services. He, however, ruled out fund-raising in the business saying they are self-funded firm.

The Waught Property portal may have to fight with established web-portals like Magicbricks, 99acres, Housing.com among others.